System and method for improved directory assistance searches

ABSTRACT

A system and method for improved directory assistance searches involving feedback from previous calls made to telephone numbers in a vendor database, in order to improve the quality of customer service and satisfaction by the vendors associated with the telephone numbers, and to find the vendors associated with the telephone numbers that have provided quality customer service in the past. The system and method automatically rates a telephone number according to a plurality of parameters. The rating produces a relevancy score relating to the quality of customer service and satisfaction (QOCS) associated with calling the vendor telephone number. Vendors associated with telephone numbers that score high on the QOCS scale are given priority to incoming calls from consumers seeking directory assistance in the vendors&#39; field. Feedback between a calling party customer and a called party vendor is possible, in real time, before, prior to, or after the actual conversation between customer and vendor, and multiple vendors may be called and screened automatically by the system in response to specific calling party needs. In one embodiment of the system, dirty numbers (numbers reassigned to a second party from a previous party) are screened. In another embodiment, vendors who consistently score high on the QOCS scale may be targeted for solicitation. In yet another embodiment, a method is disclosed for assessing an advertising fee based on referrals received by vendors using the present invention. In another embodiment, a web interface version of the invention is disclosed.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119(e) to commonlyassigned, provisional U.S. Patent Application Ser. No. 60/930,857,entitled “SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR IMPROVED DIRECTORY ASSISTANCE”, listingas inventors Richard Rosen, filed May 18, 2007, incorporated byreference herein.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of Invention

The present invention relates generally to the field of automateddirectory assistance.

2. Description of Related Art

The present invention relates generally to automated directoryassistance.

Directory assistance ranges in the prior art from interfacing with ahuman operator who responds with telephone numbers associated with knownparties, to automated methods such as Google Voice Local Search(Goog411), where a party may call an 800 number, request the specifictelephone number of a particular business party, or a general category(e.g. “Greek restaurants in Los Angeles”), which will be recognized byautomatic voice recognition means and a candidate vendor or number ofcandidates will be presented to the user for telephonic connection.

Call detail records can record for any telephone call the number of thecaller, day, date, duration, disposition (e.g. busy/not busy), number ofrings, connections and the like, by which companies can ascertain howoften a particular telephone is called and other rudimentary data fromcall detail record data.

A directory, as used in computing and telephony, refers to a repositoryor database of information which is heavily optimized for reading.Commonly, a directory supports search and browsing in addition to simplelookups. Directories may be printed (e.g. print telephone directory) orelectronic form (e.g. the internet website located atwww.yellowpages.com.)

An expert system is an Artificial Intelligence (AI) application thatuses a knowledge base of human expertise for problem solving. Itssuccess is based on the quality of the data and rules obtained from thehuman expert. An expert system derives answers by running the knowledgebase through an inference engine, which is software that interacts withthe user and processes the results from the rules and data in theknowledge base. An expert system may be populated with information bythe process of knowledge acquisition, which is the process of acquiringknowledge from a human expert for the expert system, and can beorganized into IF-THEN rules, using a knowledge base, or some other formof knowledge representation. A knowledge base is a database of rulesabout a subject used in AI applications. A knowledge based expert systemis an AI application that uses a database of knowledge about a subject.

Examples of expert systems include systems used in medical diagnosis,equipment repair, investment analysis, financial, estate and insuranceplanning, vehicle routing, contract bidding, production control andtraining.

Phone systems are communication channels connecting, either wirelesslyor with wires, end users to one another, either in real-time voice ordata interactions (i.e., transactions between end users occurringimmediately) or batch-time processing (e.g. voice mail). A variety ofhardware and software devices can be connected to the communicationchannels, including but not limited to land-line phones, wirelessphones, PDAs (personal digital assistants), computers connected to apacket network, including the internet (e.g. Skype) and the like.

Quality of Service (QOS) is a defined level of performance in a datacommunications system, typically as it relates to such technical factorsas bandwidth and latency of a communications channel. However, forpurposes more relevant to the present invention, Quality of CustomerService/Satisfaction (QOCS) can be generally defined as any arbitraryand/or predetermined measure of a business that uses telephony andinteracts with the public, that is determined according to the abilityof the business to provide consumers with desirable service, howeverdesirable service may be subjectively and arbitrarily defined, and asdefined further herein by a weighed relevancy methodology producing arelevancy score.

Telephone networks are dynamic networks that constantly evolve andchange, not least because they are connected to human beings, networks,servers and devices that are constantly evolving and changing. Thequality of service associated with businesses also changes, asbusinesses evolve over time. But in the prior art of directoryassistance, there is presently no way of dynamically, over time,automatically acquiring, storing, managing, and disseminatinginformation about, and measuring the Quality of CustomerService/Satisfaction (QOCS) in such a way as to give a prospectivecustomer using directory assistance a measure of worth or the rating ofa business being sought, even on a real-time basis. The presentinvention addresses this concern.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, an aspect of the present invention is to provide asoftware-based system and method of automatically measuring Quality ofCustomer Service/Satisfaction (QOCS) in a telephone system deliveringvoice or data services, where a user requests search results ordirectory assistance searches for a business listing.

Another aspect of the present invention is employing a system todynamically measure and index QOCS as well as provide a calling partyuser with a relevancy score relating to QOCS for a called partyprospective business.

A further aspect of the present invention is an expert system thatelicits information from a caller as to what business goods and servicesthe caller desires.

A further aspect of the present invention involves a system and methodfor providing relevance-driven local searches of business via directoryassistance searches, where QOCS relevancy scores, which act as “merchantreviews”, will be captured at the point of a call being made by aprospective customer, with the information captured by such a systemavailable for immediate use, rather than relying on slower forms ofinformation use such as exchange by word of mouth, customer reviews,reviews in traditional media, ratings by consumer oriented agencies, andthe like. Thus the present invention uses the actual connection databehind a call to rate the merchant.

Another aspect of the present invention concerns the scoring methodologybehind QOCS relevancy scores, to determine the QOCS of businesses to acaller seeking business listing directory assistance searches based on avariety of factors, including but not limited to data comprising (asdefined further herein): disconnected numbers, busy signals, No Answeror Not Answered signals, answering machine/voicemail/IVR reached,average call length, consumer feedback, average historic relevancyscore, (AHRS)/differential historic relevancy score (DHRS), spam, vendorplacement, advertisement or lead fees, timeliness/price/quality,financial and business data, and miscellaneous data, as well asreal-time answers from vendors to caller questions.

A further of the present invention is the ability of a caller to makemultiple inquires to called parties, making searches for prospectivebusiness in parallel, with feedback to and from the calling party andthe called party. Yet another aspect is the ability of a calling partyto search for another called party, within the first call to the firstcalled party, in a parallel search, and for called parties to bid onpreferences set by the calling party.

Yet another aspect of the present invention is a method for a callingparty to rate their experience with the called party.

A further aspect of the present invention involves the blocking oftelemarketing spam or wrong numbers.

Still another aspect of the present invention is the ability to cleannumbers that have been reassigned from one party to another, so-called“dirty numbers”, so that the dirty number may successfully be used bythe second party without receiving calls directed to the first party.

Another aspect of the present invention is the ability for a calledparty to respond to feedback from a calling party, and for a calledparty to be provided with a menu of options that may be sent as outboundmessages to the called party.

Still another aspect of the invention is assigning one or more localphone numbers to categories of advertisers to receive telephone callsfrom calling parties seeking businesses in specific categories and inspecific geographies.

A further aspect of the present invention is the ability to targetcalled or calling parties for solicitation by vendors of goods andservices, in response to QOCS relevancy scores.

Another aspect of the present invention is the ability to charge anadvertising fee based on use of the invention.

The sum total of all of the above advantages, as well as the numerousother advantages disclosed and inherent from the invention describedherein, creates an improvement over prior techniques.

The above described and many other features and attendant advantages ofthe present invention will become apparent from a consideration of thefollowing detailed description when considered in conjunction with theaccompanying drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Detailed description of preferred embodiments of the invention will bemade with reference to the accompanying drawings. Disclosed herein is adetailed description of the best presently known mode of carrying outthe invention. This description is not to be taken in a limiting sense,but is made merely for the purpose of illustrating the generalprinciples of the invention. The section titles and overall organizationof the present detailed description are for the purpose of convenienceonly and are not intended to limit the present invention.

FIG. 1 is a flowchart showing how a caller seeking directory assistancesearches for a prospective business is provided with a relevanttelephone number according to a system that measures Quality of CustomerService/Satisfaction (QOCS).

FIG. 2A shows a flowchart according to the present invention forproviding a calling party with one or more called party telephonenumbers.

FIG. 2B shows a schematic of how a caller may interact with a calledparty, prior to being connected to the called party.

FIG. 2C shows a schematic of how a caller may interact with multiplecalled parties, prior to being connected to the parties.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart according to another embodiment of the presentinvention for screening calls that may involve “dirty numbers”, i.e.,numbers previously assigned to another party.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart for a method according to the present inventionfor targeting called or calling parties for solicitation, in response toQOCS relevancy scores.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart for a method of using the present invention thatinvolves charging an advertising fee to a called party who accepts acall completed through the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a web interface for practicing the present invention using theinternet.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart for a method of practicing the present inventionusing a web browser.

It should be understood that one skilled in the art may, using theteachings of the present invention, vary embodiments shown in thedrawings without departing from the spirit of the invention herein. Inthe figures, elements with like numbered reference numbers in differentfigures indicate the presence of previously defined identical elements.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The method and apparatus of the present invention may be software orhardwire programmed (e.g., an ASIC) to perform the functions outlinedherein, the hardware running firmware, or hardware running software,with the software existing in memory. The software may be written in anycomputer language (such as C, C++, Perl, Java or the like), and thefurther, and/or in the alternative, the software may be run by acomputer system having an operating system. The computer systemtypically has one or more processors, primary and secondary memorycooperating with the processor(s), which executes instructions stored inthe memory, I/O means such as monitor, mouse and keyboard, and anynecessary specialized hardware or firmware. Depending on the languageused to construct and implement the software, the source code, objectcode and/or executables of the software may have any number of classes,functions, objects, variables, templates, lines of code, portions ofcode and constructs (collectively and generally, “a process step”,“process”, “method”, “methodology”, “procedure”, “software portion”,“step”, “block”, “functional module” or “software module”) to carry outthe invention in successive stages as described and taught herein, andmay be either a standalone software application, or employed inside ofor called by another software application, or as firmware. The softwareprocess or software module may be constructed so that one portion ofcode in the application performs a plurality of functions, as forinstance in Object Oriented programming (e.g., an overloaded process).The converse is also true, in that a plurality of portions of code couldperform a plurality of functions, and still be functionally the same asa single portion of code. At any stage of the process step of thepresent invention, intermediate values, variables and data may be storedfor later use by the program. In addition, the binary executable orsource code data comprising the software of the present invention mayreside on computer readable storage medium (e.g., a magnetic disk, whichmay be portable); memory (e.g., flash RAM); DVD or CD-ROM.

Some portions of the detailed descriptions are presented in terms ofprocesses, procedures, logic blocks, functional blocks, and othersymbolic representations of operations on data bits, data streams, orwaveforms within a computer, processor, controller, and/or memory. Aprocess, procedure, logic block, functional blocks, operation, and thelike, described herein, is generally considered to include physicalmanipulations of physical quantities, that may take the form ofelectrical, magnetic, optical, or any other signals capable of beingstored, transferred, combined, compared, and otherwise manipulated in acomputer, data processing system, or logic circuit. It has provenconvenient at times, principally for reasons of common usage, to referto these signals as bits, waves, waveforms, streams, values, elements,symbols, characters, terms, numbers, or the like.

The present invention relates generally to the field of local search.Local search ranges in the prior art from interfacing with printeddirectories or listings of local businesses, yellow pages directories,automated directory assistance services, live-person directoryassistance services; internet web sites, mobile device browsers withaccess to the internet, internet yellow pages, electronic directories orother software applications in order to search for and locate telephonenumbers associated with known parties. In the present invention, partiesmay request, inter alia, the specific telephone number of a particularbusiness party, or a general category (e.g. “Greek restaurants in LosAngeles”); further, in the present invention business parties may belisted by a variety of factors including location of the business,specialty of business (e.g. “restaurant with catering services in LosAngeles”); parties may request specific brands sold by or serviced bythe business (e.g. “Ford car dealer in Los Angeles”), business reviews,hours of operation, coupons or discounts offered, business affiliations,certifications or licensing, locations serviced by the business, numberof locations of the business, methods of payment or other factors.Parties may be searched based on the content of the party's internetwebsite, as explained further below. Parties may be listed or ranked ina directory of like business parties, for example, an advertisingcampaign may instruct consumers to call “800-LA-PLUMR” for the categoryof quality plumbers that operate in the Los Angeles region. This rankingmay be alphabetical, location-based, based on specialty of the business,reviews of the business or other factors. Parties may also payadvertising or listing fees to be listed higher in the directoryresults. The listing fees may be based on distribution of the directorymeasured in circulation (number of persons receiving and using thedirectory). The listing fee may be based on usage and measured in thenumber of searches, queries, listed results, unique users, and uniquetelephone calls to the business party or other measures of usage of thedirectory or measures of communication between the searching party andthe business party. The listing fee may be based on specific requestsfor information including requests for a business party's phone number,physical address, and/or email address. The listing fee may be based onemail communication, text messages, fax messages, voice messages, andother communication sent to the business party. The communication may bea free form message communicated to the business party or a specificrequest for information sent to the business party whereas the searchingparty completes a form or questionnaire for the business party. Whilethe above is a general outline of local search capabilities of thepresent invention, the present invention is not limited to just theseforms of local search and the scope of the invention is not thuslimited.

Turning attention to FIG. 1, there is shown a flowchart showing how acaller seeking search results for a prospective business is providedwith a relevant telephone number relating to one or more suchprospective businesses, the called party, according to a relevancyscored system that measures Quality of Customer Service/Satisfaction(QOCS). QOCS is measured by a methodology that computes a relevancyscore comprised of a plurality of parameters. Search results (ordirectory assistance searches) can be seen as comprising a local search,but not just a local search involving directory assistance from a POTS(Plain Old Telephone System) but a national search (across a widegeographical area, such as an entire country), a web-based search, aswell as a mobile phone search (using SMS or a mobile web browser forinputting the search request and obtaining information) for assistancein finding information. Search results generally comprise data, andvoice data is considered data on a telephonic network. Though in generalsearch results are requested by a human being, in principal, and coveredby the present invention, a search result could be requested by a robotor other automated means of conveying information, including software.

QOCS is generally defined herein as any arbitrary and/or predeterminedmeasure of a business that uses telephony (which, as described herein,includes the Internet and any system that moves data) and interacts withthe public, that is determined according to the ability of the businessto provide consumers with desirable service, however desirable servicemay be subjectively and arbitrarily defined, and as defined furtherherein by a weighed relevancy methodology producing a relevancy score.Typically desirable service is service that is prompt, timely,competitively priced, recommended, and the like.

The flowchart of FIG. 1 is executed by a software program running onhardware, having access to a database, which is operatively connected tothe software, either as part of the software or separate from thesoftware, and the database may be split into a plurality of separatedatabases that may or may not be connected with one another. Thesoftware may be written in a procedural and/or object-oriented language.Though the flow of the present invention is shown in the figures herein,other steps not shown, as understood by one of ordinary skill in the artfrom the teachings herein, may also be present. In addition, if theprogram was written in an object-oriented language, rather than aprocedural language, there might be numerous objects that areinstantiated and executed dynamically, at run time, or that might becomeactivated upon the expiration of a count-down timer or the like, as isknown per se in OOP (Object Oriented Programming). The flowchart forsuch an OOP version of the present invention could be expressed as a UML(Unified Modeling Language) diagram rather than the flowchart as shownin FIG. 1. However, this recasting of the description of the presentinvention would in no way alter its underlying nature.

The program of the present invention interacts with a database, asexplained further herein, which is typically a relational database butcan be any database or any store of data, including but not limited to ahierarchical or object database or a spreadsheet or a non-database flatfile accessed for the information therein. The particular programminglanguage, programming paradigm or database used to construct the presentinvention is not limited to a particular language, programming style ordatabase.

The present invention may employ a rules-based expert system (e.g.“If-Then” rules) to determine information from the user, as is known perse. Further, the present invention may use a knowledge-based expertsystem to derive answers to questions from a user of the system, and theexpert system can derives answers by running a knowledge base through aninference engine, which is software that interacts with the user andprocesses the results from the rules and data in the knowledge base. Inaddition, the expert system may be a hybrid expert system that combineselements of both rules-based and knowledge-based expert systems. Inaddition, the present invention may query a database using a querylanguage or database language such as SQL (Structured Query Language),or any of its derivatives, to access information in the database.

Turning attention to FIG. 1, the program of the present invention startsin step 10, labeled “Start”. The program starts when a caller, typicallya consumer (or vendee) of business goods and services provided by thecalled party (e.g. the business vendor), seeks directory assistancesearches, e.g. by calling 800-FAST-411. The directory assistance searchprovided by the present invention may be accessed from anycommunications device, including a traditional plain old telephonesystem (POTS) using a landline telephone handset, from a handheldwireless mobile phone (and/or cell phone), from a PDA, from a web-basedinternet browser (as part of a PC, as part of a cell phone or as part ofa PDA, e.g. a BlackBerry), or any other kind of system forcommunicating, with the understanding that when referring to a“telephone call” or “incoming call” herein the corresponding equivalentinformation transmitted via computer binary data would be substituted,e.g., by a device such as a web-based internet browser and the like,with appropriate hardware, known per se, for routing any computer binarydata, such as from a web server, in lieu of routing telephonic data byusing telephony hardware and software. Further, in the presentinvention, as explained herein, at the database system back-end thesearching of data is done automatically via hardware and software, andthe fact that one may also optionally insert a live human operator toaid in the directory assistance search, as explained in one embodimentof the invention herein, doeS not detract from the automated nature ofthe present invention.

In step 20 of FIG. 1, labeled “Match Caller Request to List of VendorCandidate Telephone Numbers”, a caller's telephone request for a vendoris matched by the software of the present invention to a list of vendorcandidate telephone numbers found from database 30, so that data from atelephone call may be identified and matched with data residing in adatabase, and the incoming call may be appropriately routed by thesoftware system comprising the present invention, e.g. if the caller isrequesting a plumber that works in Los Angeles, the database 30 will bequeried for LA plumbers and a suitable list of potential candidatevendors of plumbing services will be found. To further identify a callerrequest, an expert system working with voice recognition software (whichincludes any other interactive voice response) may guide the callingparty user and elicit further responses from the user. For example, ifthe calling party requests a taxicab, the expert system might ask aseries of questions, that lead to further questions, such as: “Do youneed a pick-up within the hour?”, and, if not, “Do you need a pick-uplater today?” or “Do you need a pick-up later this week?”, or, “Whattime do you need a pick-up?”; “How many people in your party?”, and, ifthe number of people exceed say four, “Do you want a town car, a stretchlimo, or a van?”; as well as, “Do you request a price quote?”; or “Doyou wish to speak to a live operator?”.

In decision diamond step 40, labeled “Vendor Candidate Telephone ListExhausted?”, each of these potential candidate telephone numbers(assuming there is more than one) will be examined in turn, in order todetermine the potential candidate(s) best suited for the job, inaccordance with a QOCS methodology as explained further herein.

Though a single vendor, unknown to the public, can have a number ofdifferent candidate telephone numbers and thus appear to be differentvendors to the public, the usual case assumed in the present inventionis for a particular candidate vendor to be associated with one or moretelephone numbers, though in no way is the present invention limited byhidden associations between vendors and telephone number(s).Furthermore, in a preferred embodiment of the invention rather than atelephone number or numbers being associated with a vendor, the databaseis provided with a key comprising a unique identification number (uniqueID) that is used to identify a merchant with one or more telephonenumbers. Throughout this application a telephone number is discussed inconnection with a vendor for expository purposes, however, consistentwith database development and database theory, in practice a unique IDmay be used as a key to be associated with a vendor name. Using a uniqueID one skilled in the art can identify a merchant vendor and keep trackof any rating of this vendor, even if the telephone number(s) associatedwith the merchant constantly change (whether the telephone numberschange haphazardly or change by design, as perhaps if the vendor wastrying to disassociate themselves from a poor rating by changing theirtelephone number). However, the use of a unique ID to track vendorsassociated with a telephone number(s), rather than tracking thetelephone number(s) themselves as taught herein for clarity ofexposition, does not in any way change the underlying nature of theinvention as described herein, and the use of such a unique ID is adatabase programming detail well within the scope of the invention astaught herein. Therefore, for clarity and ease in exposition it isassumed throughout the present disclosure that a candidate telephonenumber (or numbers) is/are the equivalent of, and/or can be tracked by,a unique ID that is associated with one particular merchant vendor(i.e., the called party).

If there is more than one candidate telephone number, the flow of theprogram continues along the “No” branch of decision block 40 to decisiondiamond step 50.

At decision block 50, labeled “Relevancy Score Parameter List ExhaustedFor Particular Vendor Candidate Telephone Number?”, a decision step isreached regarding the methodology for determining the QOCS for anyparticular telephone number. The QOCS is determined by analyzing anynumber of historical parameters (e.g. historical data) that areassociated with the telephone number, and assigning a rating to thetelephone number based on any grouping of the historical parameters ordata. The historical data or parameters are simply data associated withthe telephone number gathered from previous callers to the number. Togive a simple example, a historical datum or parameter might be thenumber of times the telephone in question gave a busy signal whendialed. A telephone number that is frequently busy would receive a lowerQOCS rating than one that was not always busy, all other factors beingequal. However, whether or not a lower or higher rating is assigned forparticular historical data is not paramount to the present invention;perhaps even a low QOCS rating would be useful to know in a qualityassurance survey. Further details for one methodology of grouping thehistorical parameters and data as a weighted sum are given below.

Initially, the first time the decision diamond 50 is reached, theprogram will proceed along the “No” branch to step 60, the box labeled“Query Db Telephone Number For Parameter In Question”. A database 30,which typically is the same database throughout the invention, isqueried for a series of parameters that comprise the QOCS for aparticular telephone number from the vendor candidate telephone numberlist, with the parameters as explained further herein. In step 70,labeled “Update Relevancy Score for Vendor Telephone No. in List”, therelevancy score for the particular telephone number is computed for theparticular parameter in question, and the process is repeated byproceeding back to decision diamond step 50 until all the parametersfrom a parameter list are exhausted, at which point flow of the programproceeds along the “yes” branch to decision diamond 50, and the nextvendor candidate telephone number is examined in step 40 to determineits relevancy score, and the process is repeated.

The steps in steps 50, 60, 70 are for expositional purposes shown as asequential determination of the relevancy score for a particulartelephone number, in accordance with historical data or parametersassociated with the telephone number, with each parameter examined oneat a time from the database 30. In fact, however, the relevancy scorecan be computed beforehand for a particular candidate telephone number,without the need for a sequential querying of the database 30. Further,though a relational database is preferably employed for database 30, infact any kind of database can be employed, even a flat file simplystoring data, or hierarchical or object databases. Further, database 30is shown in FIG. 1 as a single database but in fact can be multipledatabases, even distributed in a network.

Flow of the program of FIG. 1 proceeds, once all candidate telephonenumbers are assigned and associated with a relevancy score, along the“Yes” branch of decision diamond 40, to box step 80 labeled “PresentSorted Vendor Telephone List to Caller”. There, a sorted list ofcandidate telephone numbers is presented to the caller, generally withthe highest ranked QOCS telephone numbers presented first, as rankingwas determined by the relevancy scores for the different telephonenumbers obtained from the previous steps. At this point, as explainedfurther herein, the caller makes one or more calls to called parties(vendors) associated with the vendor candidate telephone numbers. Oncethe call(s) are made by the calling party, in step 90, labeled “UpdatedB with any Post-presented call statistics”, any statistics, asexplained further herein, associated with any call(s) made by thecalling party are recorded in the database 30. The database 30 isupdated with these post-call statistics, in order to update therelevancy scores associated with the telephone numbers stored indatabase 30, for future use by the program for subsequent callers tothese numbers. In step 100, the program ends.

As taught herein, telephone numbers that are ranked with the highestQuality of Customer Service/Satisfaction (QOCS) scores are presentedfirst to any calling party (i.e. to the consumer of directory assistancesearches). The QOCS is determined by a relevancy methodology thatproduces a relevancy score for every telephone number (and consequentlyevery vendor(s) associated with this number). The relevancy score iscomprised of a plurality of parameters, historical data or factorsrelevant to the telephone number; in one preferred embodiment, therelevancy score is presented herein as a weighted sum.

Thus, regarding the weighted sum formulation for the relevancy score,the parameters or factors p(i) that constitute the relevancy score orQOCS relevancy score is termed “RS” (Relevancy Score/Relevancy Sum). RScan be considered, by way of example and not limitation, as the weightedsum of a plurality of factors p(i) such that (eq. 1):RS=Σ(α(i)*p(i))=SUM(α(i)*p(i))  {equation no. 1}

-   -   for all i in a series of parameters, where α(i)=the i^(th)        coefficient constant in a series, e.g. a decimal fraction acting        as a weighing factor, and p(i)=the i^(th) QOCS parameter in the        series constituting the QOCS relevancy score, sum RS.

To illustrate equation no. 1 more concretely, consider a relevancy scorethat will judge a merchant vendor and assign them a score according totwo parameters p(i): p(1), how many calls out of a total number ofhistorical calls that are not answered, and, p(2), the average length ofcalls answered (measured in seconds). Further, regarding thecoefficients, calls that are not answered, p(1), are afforded twice theweight (i.e. twice the importance) assigned to the average length ofcalls, p(2). Hence a(1)=⅔=0.67 while a(2)=⅓=0.33. Suppose Vendor #1 has50% of calls not answered (as measured from a database recording totalcalls made in the past), with an average call length of calls answeredfor Vendor #1 of 30 seconds, while Vendor #2 answers 90% of calls, withonly 10% not answered, and an average call length of 120 seconds peranswered call. Suppose the average call lengths are normalized betweenthe two vendors, as a percentage of the total, such that for exampleVendor #1 has 10 calls averaging 30 seconds, for a total of 300 secondsof answered call time, while Vendor #2 has 50 calls averaging 120seconds, for a total of 6000 seconds (50*120), giving a total of 6300seconds of answered call time between the two vendors. Thus, normalizingthe answered call time, Vendor #1 has 4.76% of the total answered calltime (300/6300) while Vendor #2 has 95.2% of the total time (6000/6300).

RS in this example for the two vendors equals: RS (Vendor#1)=0.67*(0.50)+0.33*(0.0476)=0.335+0.016=0.351; while RS (Vendor#2)=0.67*(0.90)+0.33*(0.952)=0.603+0.3142=0.917. Or, on a scale of 0(worse) to 100 (best), Vendor #1 scores 35.1 while Vendor #2 scores91.7. Vendor #2 offers a higher Quality of Customer Service/Satisfaction(QOCS) over Vendor #1 in this example, because presumably vendors thatanswer phone calls more often, and spend more time on the phone withcustomers per call, can be assumed to be servicing their customersbetter and closing more sales. However, whether or not these assumptionsregarding percentage of answered calls and length of answered calls arein fact true (as opposed to believed to be true) in determining customersatisfaction, QOCS, vendor success, or any other related thing beingmeasured, is immaterial to the present invention. What is important isthat some relevancy score can be assigned to the vendors using some setof historical data or parameters, with suitable predetermined andarbitrarily assigned weighing factors, as taught herein. Further, eq. 1is in no way limiting to the invention—for example instead of summingthe parameters p(i) one may chose to multiply them together. Or,parameters p(i) may be considered as forming for RS a polynomialequation so that the terms p(i) are raised to some n^(th) power, andmultiplied by the coefficients α(i). In addition, the weighing of theparameters (the value of the decimal fraction weighing factors in eq. 1above), as well as the number of appropriate parameters (p(i) in eq. 1above), can be adjusted, added to, deleted or combined in any arbitrarymanner in light of additional survey evidence made in the field byresearchers measuring QOCS and/or vendor success, as can be appreciatedby one of ordinary skill from the teachings herein. The user of thesystem, e.g. the calling party, could even be invited to inputpreferences that would dynamically adjust the weighing factors (e.g. “Ifyour call cannot answered, do you want to leave voicemail? Press 1 ifyou don't mind, Press 2 otherwise”). The calling party can likewisechose from a list of vendors and be presented with their QOCS relevancyscores and/or parameters comprising the QOCS relevancy scores, and/orthe system can automatically default to present first to the callingparty the vendor with the highest QOCS relevancy score or a parameterconstituting the QOCS relevancy score. Further, the above example withtwo parameters is simply illustrative of the process used to determinethe relevancy score using only two parameters, and not meant to belimiting to the invention.

In the present invention, a single parameter can be employed tocalculate the relevancy score, or many more than just two parameters canbe employed for calculating the relevancy score. By way of illustrationbut not limitation, the following historical data and/or parameters,termed QOCS parameters, are disclosed as useful parameters that may beused in a methodology to compute a relevancy score—e.g. a relevancyscore such as RS shown by equation no. 1—for rating called parties.

Parameters Useful for a Relevancy Score

Disconnected Numbers—disconnected telephone numbers are a factor thatcan be used above for the relevancy score, such as in eq. 1. Adisconnected number presumably is annoying to a caller and would, allother things being equal, result in a lower relevancy score. If acalling party calls a called party using a disconnected telephone number(that is, the number either does not exist or no call can be completedas dialed), and a disconnected number message is returned by the programof the present invention, the status of the call is noted (e.g. the factthat the number is a disconnected number, and explicitly or implicitlyincluding information such as the time and/or date of the call). Thetelephone number associated with the called party (e.g. vendor) isupdated with the status information that a disconnected number wasreached, and this information is updated in a database by the program.

Busy Signals—if a calling party calls a called party using a particulartelephone number and a busy message signal is returned, the status of abusy signal call is noted by the program (e.g. the fact that the numberproduced a busy signal, and explicitly or implicitly includinginformation such as the time and/or date of the call). A busy signalwould result in a lower relevancy score, all other things being equal.The telephone number associated with the called party (e.g. vendor) isupdated with the status information that a busy signal number wasreached, and this information is updated in a database by the program.

No Answer or Not Answered—if a calling party calls a called party usinga particular telephone number and the call is not answered after apredetermined number of rings, e.g., 4, 5, 6, 7 or more rings, the callis marked as unanswered/not answered. The telephone number associatedwith the called party (e.g. vendor) is updated with the statusinformation that the call was marked a no answer/not answered, and thisinformation, including explicitly or implicitly any additionalinformation such as the time and/or date of the call, is updated in adatabase by the program. An unanswered/not answered call would result ina lower relevancy score, all other things being equal.

Answering Machine/Voicemail/IVR—if a calling party calls a called partyusing a particular telephone number and the call is connected to ananswering machine, voicemail box, or IVR (Interactive Voice Responseapplication), the call is marked as AM/VM/IVR. The telephone numberassociated with the called party (e.g. vendor) is updated with thestatus information that the call was marked AM/VM/IVR, and thisinformation, including explicitly or implicitly any additionalinformation such as the time and/or date of the call, is updated in adatabase by the program. A call marked AM/VM/IVR would result in a lowerrelevancy score, all other things being equal. In the art there areknown per se hardware and/or software devices for determining when ananswering machine, voicemail box or IVR receives a call, as opposed toan actual (live) person.

Average Call Length—if a calling party calls a called party using aparticular telephone number and the call is received by a live person,the length of time elapsed in the telephone call connection between thecalling and called parties is noted. The telephone number associatedwith the called party (e.g. vendor) is updated with the statusinformation regarding this length of time, and this information,including explicitly or implicitly any additional information such asthe time and/or date of the call, is updated in a database by theprogram. Further, the database may store data associated with aparticular telephone number belonging to a vendor to include informationsuch as the average call length (e.g. in seconds) associated with theparticular telephone number, with the average chosen for any arbitraryor predetermined period of time (e.g. a range of dates, say a periodover the last 90 days). In addition, calls that are not answered/noanswered or marked AM/VM/IVR may be assigned a call length of zero. Byway of illustration but not limitation, one theory in Quality ofCustomer Service/Satisfaction (QOCS) is that a call having high QOCS iscorrelated with a high average call length, under the premise that shortcalls in most industries are likely calls that did not result in manymeaningful interactions (such as appointments or sales). Thus atelephone number associated with a low average call length would resultin a lower relevancy score for that number than a telephone numberassociated with a high average call length, all other things beingequal.

Consumer Feedback—when a calling party calls a called party using aparticular telephone number, a calling party may be prompted by theprogram of the present invention to rate the merchant at the conclusionof the call, e.g. via a simple binary “Yes/No” prompt on the callingparty's mobile phone asking an answer to the question “Called Party(Vendor) was helpful?”. This information may be collected by the programof the present invention and stored in a database, and associated withthe telephone number of the called party, including explicitly orimplicitly any additional information such as the time and/or date ofthe call. Furthermore, as explained further herein, consumer callingparty feedback may be solicited at any time, during or after a callingparty makes a call (i.e., not necessarily in real-time during theplacement of the call), so that a calling party may be asked via a liveoperator, via an email, or via an automated call whether the calledparty was helpful, and any response from the calling party regardingeither the called party or the call may be stored.

Average historic relevancy score (AHRS)/Differential historic relevancyscore (DHRS)/Statistical parameters—an average historic relevancy score(AHRS) or differential historic relevancy score (DHRS) can be used torate telephone numbers. Regarding the average historic relevancy score(AHRS), the relevancy score RS of equation no. 1 for a particulartelephone number associated with a called party (vendor) may be storedin a database as a running average (an average computed as more and morecalls are made to the particular telephone number) to comprise anaverage historic relevancy score (AHRS) over a particular time period(e.g. a range of dates). This average historic relevancy score (AHRS)may be associated with any new, additional call made to the particularnumber by a calling party (i.e. a new call made after the prior callswere made), including explicitly or implicitly any additionalinformation such as the time and/or date of the new, additional call.The advantage of storing the average historic relevancy score (AHRS) ofa particular telephone number, whenever any new call is made by thecalling party to the particular telephone number, is that computation ofthe average historic relevancy score (AHRS) for that number is madequicker and easier, since the average relevancy score information hasalready been computed and is available immediately. However, as can beappreciated by one of ordinary skill in the art, computation of theaverage historic relevancy score (AHRS) for a series of calls can bedone at any time, including in real time when a new call is made,depending on the computing hardware available, the amount of computermemory, the number of prior calls, and the like. In addition, ratherthan just an average historic relevancy score (AHRS), a parameter inthis category can include a differential historic relevancy score(DHRS), based on the relevancy score RS of the last N calls made (e.g.the average of relevancy scores of the last three calls associated witha particular number), and/or can be a relevancy score that shows whetherthe relevancy scores associated with a particular telephone number arerising or falling over any arbitrary time period; this is termed adifferential historic relevancy score (DHRS). Further, the number ofcalls made to a particular number (i.e. ‘number of calls’) can berecorded, which is useful for statistical calculations of the QOCSrelevancy score, since presumably a vendor with a relevancy score of“10” on some arbitrary scale, as a result of 5000 calls, is more likelyto have a more accurate QOCS relevancy score that should be affordedgreater weight than the same QOCS relevancy score from a vendorreceiving far fewer calls, say only five calls. Other statisticalmeasures, such as standard deviation of data, may be employed on thedata collected by the present invention.

Spam—when a telephone number associated with a called party (vendor) isdetermined to be a number from which unsolicited calls are frequentlymade, e.g. cold calls from telemarketers, hereinafter a spam telephonenumber, the spam telephone number can be assigned a score reflecting itis spam, and this will influence the relevancy score for the particularspam telephone number, resulting in a lower relevancy score for thenumber, all other things being equal.

Vendor placement, advertisement or lead fees—called parties (vendors)can pay a fee to the licensee or owner of the present invention to havetheir candidate telephone numbers placed higher in the relevancy scoreranking than would otherwise be the case.

Timeliness/Price/Quality—the timeliness of the vendor associated with aparticular telephone number, as timeliness is measured by any objectiveor subjective manner, may be employed as a parameter for determining therelevancy score of the telephone number. Timeliness may be measured by asurvey, such as a post-sale survey, or in response to a real-time queryby the calling party (e.g. “need emergency plumber now—are you availablewithin 1 hour?”), or in response by a vendor to an automated questionfrom the program of the present invention, which may be asked before orduring the call by the calling party, as explained further herein.Further, price may likewise be a parameter (e.g. “need the plumber'shourly rate to be less than $65 an hour”), that may be set by thecalling party. Finally, quality of the goods or services may be aparameter, as measured by grading (e.g. Grade A USDA produce; “fine” or“extra fine” designations), the number of Better Business Bureau orregulatory agency complaints against the called party associated with atelephone number, post-sale surveys of the quality of goods and servicesprovided, and the like.

Financial and business data—financial ratios such as the total salesrevenue of the vendor associated with a particular telephone number,number and geographic location of stores of the vendor, marketcapitalization and the like may be parameters to any relevancy scorerating of the telephone number. Other such business and financial datafor use in a relevancy score may include: competitive advertisingspending; founded date; company size (employees); revenue; category(line of business); address (residential vs. commercial); geography(MSA); call volume; single franchise location, or multi franchiselocation; franchise, or chain; credit and lines of credit; number ofphone lines; number of outlets (local, super-local, regional, national);square footage; type of phone (business, cell); and private versusfranchise.

Miscellaneous data—the parameters used for the relevancy score rankingin the present invention are not limited to just the above examples,which are illustrative and not limiting. Any form of additional,user-defined data may be associated with a particular telephone numberand be used to rank the telephone number, without limitation. Thisincludes but is not limited to something as basic as associating thegender of the vendor associated with a particular telephone number, sothat a caller requesting a female pediatrician can be accommodated bythe relevancy ranking methodology of the present invention. Subject toall applicable privacy and discrimination laws, the age, gender, race,nationality, languages spoken, education, religious affinity andnumerous other personal characteristics of a vendor associated with aparticular telephone number are also possible as historical data orparameters, classified as personal miscellaneous data. Photographs ofthe called party and graphics associated with the called party (e.g. abusiness logo) can also be classified as miscellaneous data associatedwith a telephone number. Thus a movie director who wants to query theprogram of the instant invention for telephone numbers of actors underage 25 that have blond hair and are living in Los Angeles can, if aphotograph is associated with the telephone number, and using suitablephoto image recognition software, find all such actor telephone numbersin an automated fashion. Another form of miscellaneous data might bepopularity, as popularity is determined from relevancy scores in thedatabase from previous calls to vendors in the same field and/orgeographic area, or simply as the vendor that gets the most calls. Afurther example of miscellaneous data could be the latency of a websiteassociated with a called party, with a company penalized in relevancyscore if it does not support adequate IT infrastructure to support afast response. Numerous other examples along these and other linesshould be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art using theteachings herein.

Turning attention now to FIG. 2A, there is shown a flowchart accordingto the present invention for providing a calling party (typically aconsumer, customer or user of directory assistance searches) with one ormore called party (e.g. vendor) telephone numbers. In step 200, labeled“Start”, the program starts. In step 205, labeled “Caller CallsDirectory Assistance”, the caller calls a number, e.g. 800-FAST-411,that interacts with the hardware and software of the present invention,which can include a PBX (or Centrex and the like), fast internet access,computer system and any other hardware and software necessary tointerface with the user, as are known per se in telephony andinformation technology. The system of the present invention preferablytries at all times to maintain connections within the system between theuser-caller and the vendor-called party, thus acting as middleware/amiddleman, in order to better service them and collect information fromthem. In step 210, labeled “Caller Identifies Need”, the calleridentifies a directory assistance need, such as a taxicab ride, whichmay be recognized by an expert system using voice recognition technology(or other interactive voice technology, such as an IVR system using atouch pad or other input device). Another aspect of the invention, whichcan be implemented anywhere within the present invention, such as atstep 210, is to assign one or more local phone numbers to categories ofadvertisers to receive telephone calls from calling parties seekingbusinesses in specific categories and in specific geographies. Forexample, an advertising campaign may instruct consumers to call“800-LA-PLUMR” for the category of quality plumbers that operate in theLos Angeles region. The called party plumbers could be monitored by thepresent invention for quality assurance purposes, as taught herein, andcould be rotated into and out of a specific category based on how high aQOCS rating they achieve. Thus, the specific local phone numbers(DID—Direct Inward Dial—numbers), in this example “800-LA-PLUMR”, will,when dialed, reach called parties in the same category of business (e.g.plumbing), and in the same geography (e.g. Los Angeles), but thespecific called parties behind the scenes will vary. The order thatcalled parties receive calling party calls may vary according to, by wayof example, how high a QOCS score the called parties achieve over anyparticular time period, with the top ranked called parties retained tobe called first by the calling party, and the bottom ranked calledparties periodically rotated out in favor of new called parties. Theparties can in fact be ranked over time as simply the top N calledparties (where N=an integer) as identified by the system of the presentinvention. Thus, inclusion in the list of plumbers for the example of“800-LA-PLUMR” would be those N plumbers that overall rank high in QOCSas identified by the system when consumers call for plumbers, where theplumbers reside in the Los Angeles region.

In step 215, labeled “Caller Connects To Situation Template Menu ToPinpoint Caller Request”, the caller connects to a user interface of theprogram, which also may be driven by an expert system that elicitsfurther information from the caller in response to the caller's initialrequest in step 210. The system in step 215 interacts with whateverhardware the caller is using, in order to receive input from theconsumer (e.g. a mobile phone having a display; or automated voicerecognition software in the program interacts with the spoken words ortouch tone keypad inputs of a caller that is using a landline telephonehandset).

An example of the further interaction of step 215 is shown in FIG. 2B,showing a calling party (consumer user) 270 who identifies a need (or,equivalently, initiates a search), as in step 210 in FIG. 2A. Theconsumer calling party uses suitable hardware and/or software 275 at theuser's end to access the system of the present invention (e.g. PC,mobile device, a bridge directory assistance service that calls into atoll-free number for the present invention, e.g. 800-FAST-411). Thecaller consumer then is shown (or hears) a situation template, in FIG.2B shown as menu 280, that most closely matches the callers request forservice as determined by an expert system or otherwise. In the exampleof FIG. 2B, the caller 270 has requested a search for a taxi, and thesituation template menu 280 gives the caller a number of options to helppinpoint the user's needs, including such standard questions like “Doyou need a pick-up within the hour?”, and “Are you going to theairport?” and the like. Questions reasonably related to activities thatmay be inferred by an expert system may also be asked, e.g. “Is thistaxi for a wedding or event?”, and, if the caller answers yes, thesystem can ask “Do you require stretch limousine quotes for a wedding orother event?”, and “Do you require fresh cut flowers?” and so forth.Even pricing requests can be initiated by the caller to the system atthis stage (e.g. the caller may ask the system “Can you take a group offour to the airport for a flat fee of $100 or less?”), and thisinformation can be used by the system to query vendors, who can inputtheir responses to the system, as explained further herein. In the eventthe situation template is not adequate to pinpoint the caller's need,means can be provided to allow the caller user to input a user-definedanswer or question, or the system can forward the caller to a live humanoperator that can provide assistance. Calling parties may also record amessage to be played to called parties. Calling parties may also requestan automated call back from called parties (e.g., leaving a voicemail orthe calling party asking that the called party contact them via a callback feature).

After the caller identifies the need from the situation template orotherwise, flow of the program proceeds to box 220 of FIG. 2A labeled“Ranked Vendor Candidate List Identified”. In step 220, the methodologydiscussed in connection with FIG. 1 is employed to rank a plurality ofmerchant vendor telephone numbers that are likely candidates to call inorder to fulfill the caller's need. The consumer can be presented with alist of candidate vendor phone numbers, ranked from best to worse (apredetermined arbitrary ranking as determined by the Relevancy Score asdiscussed herein), and the consumer can select to dial any candidatevendor from the list presented.

In addition, concurrently with step 225 in FIG. 2A labeled “System DialsParty/Parties in Vendor Candidate List/Feedback Solicited”, the programof the present invention can in parallel dial multiple vendorsautomatically and present a list of demands as identified by the callingparty consumer in the menu 280 of FIG. 2B—this can be done behind thescenes, unknown to the consumer, who can be placed on hold. The vendors(the prospective called party), such as called party 285 in FIG. 2B, canaccept or reject the potential call by the consumer based on thesedemands. The demands may be read to the vendors by the software systemof the present invention through automated recorded speech; likewise,the calling party may have their input recorded by the software systemthrough voice recognition software. If the vendors reject the consumer'sdemands, the vendor can be eliminated from the vendor candidate list,step 220 of FIG. 2A. This parallel dialing feature of the presentinvention is shown in FIG. 2C, showing the same elements as in FIG. 2Bbut with multiple vendors 290 that may accept or reject the demands madeby the consumer, and thus accept or reject the potential call. Inaddition, feedback may be solicited from these vendors via a menu ofoptions that appear on the vendors telephony display, to further screenthe candidate vendors; for example, the caller may request whether avendor is open after 6 pm. The candidate vendors could have a menuappear on their phone or PC display that states “A caller is asking ifyou are open after 6 o'clock pm. Press ‘1’ for Yes, ‘2’ for No”.Optionally additional feedback, typically text or voicemail feedback,may be sent from vendors to the calling party at this or another stage.By way of example and not limitation, a vendor could reply to a callingparty request for a price quote for a good or service by entering aprice quote. This price quote can constitute a bid by the vendor to thecalling party, and if multiple vendors are contacted by the callingparty, the calling party may be offered a menu of bids, including firstthe vendor offering the lowest bid, so the calling party can morereadily select the lowest bid, and/or optionally the QOCS relevancyscore or any particular QOCS parameters associated with each vendor, sothe calling party can select a particular vendor from a list of vendors.

Further, during this parallel dial process of step 225, candidatevendors may be automatically connected by the system to a service centerafter receiving a list of demands or inquiry from a caller. This wouldbe an option from a menu of options before the vendor's telephonysystem, and would be useful if the vendor needs approval fromheadquarters, a home office, or needs additional support, and wouldobviate the necessity for the vendor to place a separate manual call.

Once feedback is completed from any parallel dialing of vendors in step225 of FIG. 2A, the calling party consumer is given an option tointeract live with any of the remaining candidate vendors who have beenvetted and culled by the system so far. These vendors are the mostlikely vendors to satisfy the prospective called party's needs, rankedfrom best to worse according to the relevancy score methodology asexplained in connection with FIG. 1. In decision block step 230, labeled“Connection Made?”, a check is made to see if a connection is made; ifso, the call proceeds to the next block, if not, the “No” branch istaken and, in accordance with the relevancy score rating methodologydiscussed in connection with FIG. 1, a database 245 is updated toindicate the call failed (e.g. a No Answer or Not Answered call or aAnswering Machine/Voicemail/IVR call) and the program can terminate. Instep 235 of FIG. 2A, labeled “Called Party/Caller Party Interact”, thecustomer and vendor can interact in person. At decision step 240,labeled “Initial Decision Reached?”, if the caller makes a decision,meaning the caller tentatively decides to purchase the goods or servicesof the vendor, the flow of the program proceeds to diamond 250, labeled“Multiple Parties?”, otherwise flow of the program proceeds back toblock 225, as shown by the “No” branch at diamond 240, and the database245 is updated regarding the relevancy score of the vendor underconsideration, including any optional feedback from the consumer (e.g.“Called Party (Vendor) was helpful?”). As shown by the arrow in FIG. 2A,the program then continues to the next candidate in the vendor candidatelist in step 225 and the process continues until such time an initialdecision is reached at step 240. Regarding consumer feedback, theprogram of the present invention can lookup the area code and prefix(NPA/NXX) of the calling party and with some certainly know if thecaller has called from a cell phone. If so, the present invention canthen text message (SMS) the calling party and prompt them to rate thecalled party merchant. This can be done throughout the present inventionwhen feedback is solicited from a calling party.

In decision diamond step 250 in FIG. 2A, the program checks to see ifmultiple parties wish to be called by the caller. This is a separatestep from the parallel dial feature mentioned above in connection withstep 225. The “Multiple Parties?” step of decision block 250 relates towhether the caller wants to comparison shop between multiple vendors. Ifso, the vendor with which the caller reached a tentative agreement (orinitial decision) can be ‘put on hold’ or otherwise put into a standbymode, via a placeholder, such as shown by placeholder block 255, whilethe caller continues to shop for other vendors who may better meet herneeds, and the loop of steps 225, 230, 235, 240 and 250 is repeated.During this time the vendors may optionally input information into thesystem to better inform the caller, such as a bid on a price quote. Whensuch time that a final decision is reached and no more parties areeither available or wish to be contacted by the caller, the caller canthen, through a suitable interface, pick the one merchant from the listof merchants on hold or on standby that the caller wishes to engage forfinalizing a transaction, and the transaction between the caller andthat merchant can then be finalized. When this is done, there are nomore merchant parties that remain to be contacted by the consumercaller, and the program flow continues to block step 260 in FIG. 2A,labeled “Update Db With Any Post-Presented Call Statistics”; at thisstep the database 245 can be updated to reflect any new parametersaffecting the relevancy score associated with the telephone number(s) ofthe vendor(s) involved in the calls initiated by the caller, inaccordance with the relevancy score methodology discussed in connectionwith FIG. 1. In step 265, labeled “End”, the program ends.

Furthermore, the present invention contemplates that at any time before,during, or after the placement of a call by a calling party, callingparty consumer feedback may be solicited by the software any timeregarding the call experience or the called party service. This feedbackfrom the calling party may be initiated by the software to be made via alive operator, via an email, or via an automated call, asking whetherthe called party was helpful, and any response from the calling partymay be stored in database 245 by the software of the present invention.

Turning attention now to FIG. 3, there is shown a flowchart according toanother aspect of the present invention, a form of automated directoryassistance, for screening calls that may involve “dirty numbers”, thatis, numbers previously assigned to a first party being assigned to asecond party. This is an increasingly common problem, as new telephonenumbers that have never been used become less common. This feature ofthe invention can be incorporated at the merchant vendor end of thesystem, in order to prevent wrong number calls to the dirty number.Preventing wrong number calls is important because advertisers oftencharge per call, and if the wrong number is being called, the secondparty will be unfairly charged for calls that belong to the first party.

Thus in FIG. 3, a program is shown for screening calls involving dirtynumbers comprising the steps of assigning a telephone number to a secondparty, Party 2, that had previously been assigned to a first party,Party 1, as indicated by block step 300, labeled “Assign Telephone # toOne Party, Party 2”. In step 305, labeled “Monitor Calls Received byParty to Identify Patterns”, calls are monitored, such as in a PBXinterfacing with the telephone of Party 2, to monitor incoming callsreceived by Party 2. The calls received are monitored to identifypatterns, and the results of these patterns are logged into database310, which may be any kind of database but preferably a relationaldatabase, so that the data from incoming calls may be identified andmatched with the data in the database, and the incoming call may beappropriately routed by the software system of the present invention.The patterns may be found by an expert system, e.g., using “IF-THEN”rules, and/or through heuristic or statistical means. For example, byway of illustration and not limitation, the monitoring may indicate thatthe vast majority of calls received and accepted by Party 2 (asexplained further herein in connection with FIG. 3) are local callsoriginating in the 310 area code, while the few calls that are rejectedby Party 2 as wrong numbers are calls originating in the nearby 213 areacode; or the calls historically rejected by Party 2 may originate from aparticular telephone number prefix, e.g. the 323 prefix of the 310 areacode (which is the area of Gardena/Torrance), or the calls historicallyrejected by Party 2 may be a particular telephone number(s), e.g.310-XXX-XXXX (where X are some digits from 0 to 9). The calls rejectedby Party 2 could likely be calls intended for Party 1.

In step 315, labeled “Receive Calls”, incoming calls are received forParty 2. In step 320, labeled “Rec'd Call Consistent w/ID'd Pattern?”,if the received calls are consistent with a pattern or patterns, or setof rules, such as by the expert system identified in step 305, the callsare passed to Party 2, as indicated by the “Yes” branch that leads tostep 325 labeled “Pass Call to Party 2”. Otherwise, the incoming call ischallenged, as indicated by the step 330 labeled “Challenge Call”.

If, prior to, during or just after the real-time answering of the callby Party 2, Party 2 realizes the call received is a wrong number (likelyintended for Party 1), Party 2 may reject the call, as indicated indecision diamond 335 labeled “Call Rejected by Party 2?”. Rejecting thecall may be done either prior to, during or just after receiving thecall. Rejecting the call by Party 2 can be done with a suitable userinterface at Party 2's phone, e.g. a mobile display that appears justbefore, during or just after the call that states: “Reject thisCall?—Press 1; Keep this Call?—Press 2”. A default option may beemployed to accept all calls if no user input is received within apredetermined time interval. If the call is rejected, the flow of theprogram passes to step block 340 labeled “Pass Call to Party 1”, and thecall may be forwarded to another telephone number where Party 1 resides.If, on the other hand, the call is not rejected, the flow of the programproceeds to block 325 labeled “Pass Call to Party 2”. In either event,whether or not the call is rejected or accepted, the data associatedwith the call, including the area code, three-digit prefix, 10 digittelephone number, time of day and other relevant data are noted by theprogram of FIG. 3 and the relevant data is recorded in the database 310,as indicated by the block step 345, labeled “Update dB”. In this waythis data recorded in the database may be used in the future by theexpert system to screen subsequent calls received.

Screening of calls using the call screening feature of FIG. 3 is doneautomatically, with the help of input by the user as explained above; inaddition, the system may allow additional manual input of data into thesystem, where Party 2 can manually specify certain telephone numbers beblocked from being received by Party 2, or always be accepted by Party2. Party 2 can programably specify other rules for the system by manualinput, such as always blocking all calls with the Gardena/Torranceprefix. Further, Party 2 can use the invention of FIG. 3 to block spam.In step 350, labeled “End”, the program ends.

Turning attention now to FIG. 4, there is shown is a flowchart accordingto the present invention for targeting called or calling parties forsolicitation, in response to QOCS relevancy scores. This is also a formof directory assistance search, albeit initiated by the owner orlicensee of the present invention, rather than a member of the generalpublic, as the calling party, using the software system and informationstored therein to initiate a call to a vendor. The method of FIG. 4involves using the present invention as described herein to solicitbusiness from either a called party (vendor/merchant) who scores highlyin the QOCS ratings, or, applicable privacy laws permitting, even acalling party (consumer) who is found to frequently engage in calls thatresult in sales.

Thus in FIG. 4, step 400, labeled “Query dB”, the database, such asdatabase 30 in FIG. 1 and database 245 in FIG. 2A, which could be asingle or multiple databases, are queried, to identify good prospectsfor solicitation, as indicated by step 405, labeled “Identify PartiesUsing Relevancy Scoring”. These good prospects would include vendors(called parties) that score high in the relevancy scores, such asscoring high in the relevancy score (RS) of eq. 1, or consumers (callingparties) that score high using any other equivalent relevancy score forconsumers, using analogous parameters for consumers and consumer callingparty telephone numbers, such as, by way of example and not limitation:calls made, average call length, sales finalized (e.g. as reported byvendors) and the like.

In step 410 of FIG. 4, labeled “Contact Parties Identified”, the vendorsand/or consumers identified in step 405 are contacted for solicitationof goods or services by a salesperson, which is the marketing attempt.The results of the marketing attempt, whether successful or not, arelogged in a database, as indicated by step 415, labeled “Update dB”. Instep 420, labeled “End”, the methodology of the program ends.

The program of FIG. 4 is preferably automated so that a computer systemcarries out all steps except preferably the contacting of the parties atthe marketing attempt of step 410, labeled “Contact parties identified”.This marketing attempt step is preferably handled by a human salespersonwho is automatically connected to an identified party by the program ofFIG. 4, though an automated, prerecorded marketing attempt can also beperformed and within the scope of the present invention.

A typical transaction via the method of FIG. 4 would not be the “coldcall” that is traditionally unsuccessful in telephone marketing; rather,the human operator of the marketing attempt would be reaching a vendorwho likely owes a measure of their success to the present invention, andwould be grateful to the owners and licensees of the present inventionfor the customers referred to them by the present invention. Thus themethod of FIG. 4 is likely to be more successful than a traditional“cold call” sales pitch.

Turning attention now to FIG. 5, there is shown a method of using thepresent invention involving charging an advertising fee to a calledparty who accepts a call completed through the present invention. Instep block 500, labeled “Calling Party States Need For Their Call”, acalling party (customer) calls a number, e.g. 800-FAST-411, and isconnected to a called party (vendor) in accordance with the methodologyof FIG. 2 of the present invention, as indicated in step block 510,labeled “Call is Placed Using System of FIG. 2”. The customer interactswith the vendor, as indicated by step block 520, labeled “Called PartyInteracts with Calling Party”. Once the interaction is completed, alisting or advertising fee is assessed by the owner or licensee of thepresent invention against the vendor, as indicated by step block 530,labeled “Advertising Fee is Assessed”. The fee may depend on whether ornot the customer—vendor interaction resulted in a sale (or, equivalent,an appointment that may lead to a sale), with a lower fee assessed for anon-sale (or non-appointment).

The listing fees of the present invention may be based on distributionof a directory measured in circulation (number of persons receiving andusing the directory). The listing fee may be based on usage and measuredin the number of searches, queries, listed results, unique users, andunique telephone calls to the business party or other measures of usageof the directory or measures of communication between the searchingparty and the business party, as when these activities are performed inconnection with the present invention. The listing fee may be based onspecific requests for information including requests for a businessparty's phone number, physical address, and/or email address, as can betracked by the present invention. The listing fee may be based on emailcommunication, text messages, fax messages, voice messages, and othercommunication sent to the business party.

Yet another aspect of the present invention as disclosed herein, thatcan be used in any of the embodiments, is as follows: immediately aftera merchant (vendor) has received a consumer call from the system of thepresent invention, the system will call the merchant with a recordedmessage explaining the service provided by the system to the merchant(as the merchant may be unfamiliar with the service provided by thesystem of the present invention), allowing the merchant to be connectedback to any additional sales center affiliated with the system. Thesystem of the present invention will also allow the merchant to leave avoicemail message, or leave their email address so that the owners orlicensees of the present invention may forward additional informationvia a call or email.

Turning attention now to FIG. 6, there is shown a web interface forpracticing the present invention using the internet. A customer user(calling party) connects to a website and is shown a web page interfacesuch as shown in FIG. 6, optionally after logging on to their account. Asearch is conducted by the customer by typing in a keyword, at field 610(or from browsing a predetermined category), and optionally filling outor browsing a preferred location, at field 620. Thereafter, a searchbutton is clicked (button 630) and the server at the back end of the webpage finds a plurality of vendors, such as, in this example, for LAplumbers, at listing 640. These vendors have been rated according to themethodology of the present invention, involving a relevancy score. Apreferred vendor may be listed at the very top, such as at 650. Thecustomer then can input their telephone number and call, such as atfield 660, and/or click a link of the vendor the customer wishes toengage, such as the link at 670, labeled “call” and listed next to thename of each vendor (or within other positions in the user interface).In addition, the customer can click on multiple vendors in the selectedcategory and city, and dialing can be done in parallel as explainedfurther herein in connection with the customer using a telephonyinterface. The server powering the web page then connects the selectedvendor(s) with the phone number inputted by the consumer, and the systemof the present invention then calls each party and connects the partiestogether, all the while the system remaining in the loop as middlewareand/or a middleman. The consumer number, and other account details ofthe consumer, such as a default location, can be saved in an onlineaccount by checking a checkbox, such as checkbox 680 labeled “Save thisnumber”, and other similar checkboxes. The website may also include amap (e.g., from Google Maps) that shows where the vendors are located orgives directions, and/or otherwise acts as a mashup between varioussources of content and data. The mashup can be supplemented by GPSsatellite signal receiving hardware at the calling party, to locate thecalling party, as is known per se. The features of the embodiment ofFIG. 6 can be used in the other embodiments, since, as is known per se,the data transmitted through the internet is increasingly often the sameas the data in a telephony network.

Turning attention to FIG. 7, there is shown a flowchart for a method ofpracticing the present invention using a web browser, which may be acomputer web browser or mobile phone web browser, and in general thisembodiment operates the same the embodiment of the invention designedfor telephony, except that it is using the internet as a communicationsnetwork. In step 700, labeled “User Searches Online with Web Browser”, auser (the calling party) of the present invention who wishes to obtaininformation about a merchant (the called party) can search the internetonline with a web browser that may have a plug-in application toincorporate the present invention, or otherwise any other softwareapplication. The plug-in may search for a particular category or type ofmerchant (e.g., LA plumbers), or, on any particular web page, theplug-in may identify phone numbers within web pages, or other electronicpresentations of information. As phone numbers take the form of areacodes (also known as NPA), prefixes (also known as NXX) and four digits(NPA-NXX-XXXX), a series of 10 digits, or 11 digits when preceded by a1, can easily be found and a number such as 1-NPA-NXX-XXXX) is easilyidentifiable. Further, area codes and prefixes are known and assignedgeographically; for example 323-822 is the West Hollywood area of LosAngeles Calif. The invention searches for phone numbers and attempts tolocate the found phone number in a database, such as database 245 of thepresent invention. If a match is made to a business listing in thedatabase, the application identifies the category of business that hasbeen assigned the phone number (e.g., a plumber) and the applicationalso identifies the geography and address of the business (e.g., WestHollywood, Calif.), since oftentimes a calling party wants to speak to alocal merchant. The application then uses the geography and category ofthe business to retrieve other business listings from the database.These listings may be recommended businesses, based on areas of theclaimed invention. Callers to the first business phone number may thembe offered the option to place subsequent telephone calls to otherbusinesses in the geography and category in order to speak with othercompetitive businesses in order to receive a second opinion or second,or subsequent, quotes.

Thus in step 702, labeled “Phone Numbers On Web Page Identified”, theapplication of FIG. 7 identifies phone numbers on a web page asspecified herein. Next, in step 704 labeled “Web Browser CommunicatesWith QOCS Server”, the web browser plug-in will communicate with aserver that incorporates the present invention, e.g. such as taught inFIGS. 1 and 2A herein, and in step 706, labeled “QOCS Server Db QueriedFor Phone Numbers ID'd”, the application attempt to ascertain the QOCSassociated with a particular telephone number found on the webpage (andultimately a particular merchant associated with the number) by queryinga database such as database 245 in FIG. 2A. In step 708, labeled“Related Listings Identified By QOCS Server”, the application identifiesany related listings; for example, if the phone number identified on thewebpage was for a plumber in Los Angeles, then other plumbers that scorea high QOCS score and/or are in the same geographical region asidentified by the phone number are identified. In Step 710, labeled“User Web Browser Provided With Information Found”, the user of the webbrowser incorporating the present invention is provided with a list ofmerchants that can be called.

Modifications, subtractions and/or additions can be applied by one ofordinary skill from the teachings herein without departing from thescope of the present invention. For example, feedback from the systemcan inform a caller on hold as to the status of a directory assistancesearch being made by the system. Further, though numerous features ofthe present invention are disclosed, a subset of these features may beemployed in a stripped-down version of the present invention, as can beappreciated by a skilled artisan from the teachings herein, e.g. asystem that does not try and screen dirty calls, as per the embodimentof the invention disclosed in connection with FIG. 3. The scope of theinvention is thus limited solely by the claims.

It is intended that the scope of the present invention extends to allsuch modifications and/or additions and that the scope of the presentinvention is limited solely by the claims set forth below.

1. A system for directory assistance searches, comprising: a databasestoring data; a software system operatively connected to the databasefor matching data from an incoming communications device call to thedata stored by the database; a software portion from the software systemfor tracking a relevancy score relating to Quality of Customer Serviceor Satisfaction (QOCS), the relevancy score determined by parameterscomprising the data from the database; and, the incoming call is routedaccording to the relevancy score; a plurality of incoming calls arerouted by the software system to a plurality of called parties and therelevancy score relating to QOCS is tracked for each of the plurality ofcalled parties; and, the relevancy score is a weighted sum of theparameters, and the parameters are historic data derived from previousincoming calls to the called parties; and, a communications device fortransmitting the data of the communications device call, thecommunications device selected from the group consisting of a plain oldtelephone service (POTS), landline telephone handset, handheld wirelessmobile phone, cell phone, personal digital assistant (PDA) connected tomake telephone calls, Skype-based device, and web-based internet browserconnected to make telephone calls; the software portion rates theplurality of called parties according to the relevancy scores, with therating enabling ranking of the called parties; and, the relevancy scoreparameters are selected from the group consisting of average calllength, an average historic relevancy score (AHRS) including the averagecall length, a differential historic relevancy score (DHRS) includingthe average call length, number of calls, an AHRS including the numberof calls and a DHRS including the number of calls, and; wherein the datafrom the communications device call is matched with data residing in adatabase, and the incoming call may be routed by the software system. 2.The invention according to claim 1, wherein: the relevancy scoreparameters further comprises negative consumer feedback, and, therelevancy score parameters are selected from the group consisting ofdisconnected numbers, busy signals, and not answered calls, an AHRSincluding the disconnected numbers, a DHRS including the disconnectednumbers, an AHRS including the busy signals, a DHRS including the busysignals, an AHRS including the not answered calls, and a DHRS includingthe not answered calls and, the software portion allowing a callingparty to input data into the database to determine QOCS relevancy score,said calling party prompted by the software portion to rate one or morecalled parties at the conclusion of a call from the calling party to thecalled parties.
 3. The invention according to claim 1, wherein: thesoftware portion allowing a calling party to input data into thesoftware system to select a plurality of called parties, and interactwith a plurality of called parties on the same incoming call; and, therelevancy score parameters further comprises negative consumer feedback,and, the relevancy score parameters are selected from the groupconsisting of disconnected numbers, busy signals, and not answeredcalls, an AHRS including the disconnected numbers, a DHRS including thedisconnected numbers, an AHRS including the busy signals, a DHRSincluding the busy signals, an AHRS including the not answered calls,and a DHRS including the not answered calls.
 4. The invention accordingto claim 1, wherein: the relevancy score parameters are selected fromthe group consisting of disconnected numbers, busy signals, and notanswered calls, an AHRS including the disconnected numbers, a DHRSincluding the disconnected numbers, an AHRS including the busy signals,a DHRS including the busy signals, an AHRS including the not answeredcalls, and a DHRS including the not answered calls.
 5. The inventionaccording to claim 4, wherein: the software portion identifies a callingparty and initiates contact with the calling party, to allow the callingparty to input data into the database regarding the called party todetermine QOCS relevancy scores; and, the relevancy score parametersfurther comprises negative consumer feedback.
 6. The invention accordingto claim 1: the software portion allowing a calling party to input datainto the database to determine QOCS relevancy scores; a voicerecognition software portion in the software system, the voicerecognition software recognizing voice-based data from the callingparty; wherein the software system accessing the database according toan expert system selected from the group consisting of a rules-basedexpert system, a knowledge-based expert system, or a hybrid-based expertsystem; and, the relevancy score parameters further comprises negativeconsumer feedback, and, the relevancy score parameters are selected fromthe group consisting of disconnected numbers, busy signals, and notanswered calls, answering machine reached, voicemail reached,Interactive Voice Response (IVR) reached, AHRS and DHRS of these groupof parameters; wherein the database is queried by the software system tomatch data according to a Structured Query Language (SQL) query.
 7. Amethod for directory assistance searches comprising the steps of:receiving an incoming call placed from a telephony communications deviceto a software-based system for routing calls; storing data in adatabase, the database operatively connected to the software-basedsystem, the database data relating to historic data derived fromprevious calls to the software-based system; matching data from thedatabase to data from the incoming call; routing the incoming call to acalled party according to parameters comprising the data in thedatabase; and, calculating a relevancy score from the parameters, therelevancy score relating to Quality of Customer Service or Satisfaction(QOCS), the relevancy score is a weighted sum of the parameters, and theparameters are historic data derived from previous incoming calls to thecalled parties; and routing the incoming call according to the QOCSrelevancy score; and, routing a plurality of incoming calls to aplurality of called parties; tracking the relevancy score relating toQOCS for each of a plurality of the called parties; and determining therelevancy score parameters, such parameters are selected from the groupconsisting of average call length, an average historic relevancy score(AHRS) including the average call length, a differential historicrelevancy score (DHRS) including the average call length, number ofcalls, an AHRS including the number of calls and a DHRS including thenumber of calls; and, wherein the data from the incoming call is matchedwith the data from the database, and the incoming call is routed by thesoftware-based system.
 8. The method according to claim 7, furthercomprising the steps of: determining the relevancy score parameters andfurther including in the relevancy score the parameter of negativeconsumer feedback, and further including as the relevancy scoreparameters such parameters selected from the group consisting ofdisconnected numbers, busy signals, and not answered calls and the AHRSand DHRS of these parameters.
 9. The method according to claim 8,further comprising the steps of: dialing a plurality of called partiesusing the software-based system, based on the QOCS relevancy score ofthe called parties, in parallel during the same incoming call; allowinga calling party to input data to select from the plurality of calledparties during the same incoming call, the data by the calling partycomprising a list of demands identified by the calling party; and,ranking a plurality of called parties during the same incoming call by acalling party; wherein a calling party may select from a plurality ofcalled parties during the same call.
 10. The method according to claim8, further comprising the steps of: ranking the called parties accordingto the QOCS relevancy score, the called parties comprising vendors;querying the database for ranked vendors; and, initiating calls to theranked vendors for purposes of solicitation of the ranked vendors.